While fishing, it is often desirable to have spare hook and leader assemblies readily available. The hook in use may be lost because it is taken by a fish or snag and needs replacement. Or the fisherman wants to use a select or different hook and leader combination.
Modern leaders, such as those intended for spinning, spin cast, or bait casting reels, are almost entirely made from artificial substances, including nylon, polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF, and called fluorocarbon), polyethylene, Dacron and Dyneema (UHMWPE). The most common type is monofilament, made of a single strand. Fishermen often use monofilament because of its buoyant characteristics, its invisibility, and its ability to stretch under load.
In most conventional hook and leader storage devices, the leader is stored under tension. For very short leaders, this is not a problem. However, for longer leaders, the tensioned leader is wound around a core or corner. A modern leader, wound and under tension, deforms. Thus, when a long tensioned leader is removed from its holder, it will not be the straight as desired, but will be kinked, wavy, spirally or twisted. This deformation of the leader weakens the leader and makes the leader more difficult to handle. It also makes the leader more visible to fish in that it disturbs the water in front of the hook.
Several hook and leader holders have been proposed that store the leader in a non-tensioned condition. However, these have not been commercially successful. One of the reasons for their commercial failure is the inherent resilience of the leader, that is the leader will try to resume its original shape. This makes a freely wound leader unruly as the leader tries to unwind. The freely wound leaders of the prior art do not stay in their intended positions in the holder. As a result, there is a mess of tangled lines in the holder, or leaders protrude from the holder and can catch on other equipment, or the holder cannot be properly closed.
Therefore, there has been the need for hook and leader holder that overcomes the shortcomings of the prior art.